


Say You Will

by letmetellyouaboutmyfeels



Category: 9-1-1 (TV)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Fire Fam - Freeform, M/M, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, Wedding Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-07
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-13 14:27:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,238
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29902476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/letmetellyouaboutmyfeels/pseuds/letmetellyouaboutmyfeels
Summary: There are many possible ways that Buck and Eddie tie the knot.
Relationships: Evan "Buck" Buckley/Eddie Diaz (9-1-1 TV)
Comments: 53
Kudos: 277





	Say You Will

**Author's Note:**

  * For [elisela](https://archiveofourown.org/users/elisela/gifts).



> For my dear elisela on the momentous occasion of her birthday! She truly deserves nothing but good things. Much love to you, darling.
> 
> Title is from "Marry Me" by Train because my usual title-making skills were busted and that song is perfect for them.

_It Nearly Happened Like This_

Eddie’s phone is ringing.

It’s ringing… somewhere. He’s not sure where. It’s muffled. Where is…?

He cracks open his eyes and the sunlight and his head immediately start a duel over which is going to kill him first. There’s a pleasant ache in his body, a specific kind, one he hasn’t felt in… years. His mouth is dry and feels like a raccoon up and died in it, and… is that glitter?

The other side of the mattress shifts and Eddie turns slowly, realizes his skin is tacky, and sees Buck, stark fucking naked, spread out on the bed next to him.

There are red marks on his ass and Eddie has a sudden and vivid image from last night and he jolts up to sitting.

Their room is a _mess_.

His phone is still ringing.

“Buck?” He shoves at Buck’s shoulder with one hand while he looks for his phone with the other. “Buck, wake up.”

Buck groans and buries his head under a pillow.

Ah-ha. Eddie grabs the phone and answers it. “Hello?”

“What the fuck?” It’s Chim. “You know Maddie’s going to kill me when she finds out? You two promised you were only going to the bathroom!”

“What are you talking about?” Eddie puts his hand up to run it through his hair. There’s something on it. “Where are you?”

“We’re at the hotel, where we should be, the question is where are _you_ , in the honeymoon suite?”

Honeymoon…?

Eddie brings his hand down to look at what’s on it, and his stomach lurches. It’s a wedding band.

He stopped wearing his ring regularly when he became a firefighter, and then after Shannon died he just… kind of stopped wearing it at all. But now he’s got a ring on, a simple one, one he doesn’t recognize—

“Buck?” He keeps his voice carefully light. “What did we do last night?”

On the phone, Chim starts laughing. “Oh. Oh you don’t remember, do you?”

Somewhere on the other end of the line he can hear—he thinks it’s Hen—saying _were they that plastered?_

“Don’t remember what?” Eddie says, even as Buck sits up and rubs at his eyes and Eddie can see the glint of a ring on Buck’s left hand.

Chim just keeps laughing. “Check the group chat and pull yourselves together, we’re going out to brunch, we’ll see you lovebirds in a couple hours.”

He hangs up.

Eddie pulls up the group chat, heart in his throat, and finds his phone fucking blew up overnight. He has to scroll through dozens of texts making jokes and yelling at him and Buck simultaneously, until he gets to the pictures.

Oh no.

They’re pictures taken by Buck, selfie-style, of him and Eddie in some kind of wedding chapel. They’re both grinning, clearly drunk as skunks. In one of them, Eddie’s planting a kiss on Buck’s cheek. In another, they’re holding up their left hands, rings glinting in the cheap lighting.

Eddie’s not aware of his legs giving out on him but somehow he ends up sitting on the mattress again, no longer standing.

“I don’t think I can walk straight,” Buck mumbles. He swings his legs over the side of the bed, then winces and falls back onto the bed. “Make that—I don’t think I can walk, period.”

“We got married.” Eddie doesn’t quite recognize his own voice.

When Chim and Maddie said that just because the wedding was delayed a year for the baby didn’t mean they weren’t getting a proper celebration and that included a fun little trip to Vegas while Athena and Bobby took care of baby Joy, Eddie hadn’t thought it would include…

Yes, all right, he and Buck are close. More than. Ever since Buck moved in last summer it’s been… it’s been hard not to reach out, not to ask Buck to join Eddie in bed, not to press Buck against the fridge, the wall, the couch, the kitchen counter, and kiss and kiss and kiss and _kiss_ him.

They live together. They work together. Buck’s been there for Christopher since Chris was seven, now even more so, making meals and helping with homework the way he always has except—he sleeps over, he’s there in the mornings, and Eddie doesn’t know how—he doesn’t know how to say _you’re my son’s other father, do you know what that means, do you know what it does to my heart to look at the two of you?_

Sometimes he thinks that he sees something in Buck’s gaze, or the way Buck stands, how Buck will arch his hips, or how Buck will look up at Eddie through his lashes, or bite his lip—but it’s fleeting, never enough for Eddie to grasp onto, and he won’t risk—hasn’t been able to risk—losing Buck’s friendship.

Even as he and Ana faded, even as no one replaced her, even as Buck stopped his halfhearted attempts at dating… he just hasn’t been able to cross that last inch.

Until apparently last night, when he didn’t just cross that last inch, he drove all the way off the fucking cliff.

Oddly enough, the most upsetting part is he can’t remember all the very athletic sex they clearly had, if the aches in his body, the condoms on the floor, and the… mess on his skin is anything to go by.

He can’t remember kissing Buck for the first time. He can’t remember whatever he said to him as they held hands in the chapel. He can’t remember Buck sliding the ring onto his finger.

He looks over at Buck, who’s staring at the ceiling like he’s having an internal argument with his stomach over whether or not he’s going to throw up.

“Do you remember anything?”

Buck slowly turns his face to look at Eddie. “I remember… you helping me because—my hands couldn’t work. In the bathroom. And we just ended up… I went to wash my hands afterwards and then we just never left, we were talking by the sink. I don’t remember what we talked about. And then we…”

Eddie gets a flash—sitting on the sink, Buck’s hands clean but still wet, braced on Eddie’s knees, Buck’s mouth not on his, then on his, then more—kissing in a way he’s never kissed drunk before, nothing messy or rushed about it, just slow like a dream.

Maybe that’s just the blur of memory.

“We kissed.” He needs to say it out loud, somehow.

“I don’t know how we got to the… chapel,” Buck admits. “I just remember one of us pointing out—I think it was you? But I don’t know. It could’ve been me. Pointing out that we lived together, we have Chris together, why not just—why not just get married? Why wait?”

“I don’t want to know how many shots fueled that statement.” Eddie lies on his back, his head next to Buck’s, their bodies meeting in the middle.

Hurt flashes in Buck’s eyes, sharp and soft at the same time. “Do you regret it?”

 _No._ “Do you?”

Buck swallows. He looks up at the ceiling, then at the chaos of the destroyed hotel room, then back at Eddie. “I… wouldn’t have planned it this way. But I don’t… want to take it back.”

He’s not about to kiss Buck with his mouth tasting as bad as it does, but he reaches up, finds Buck’s left hand with his own, and intertwines their fingers. The rings clink together.

“Me neither,” he admits.

Buck squeezes his hand, and smiles—and Eddie remembers that smile, across the altar at the chapel last night, in the casino bathroom after their kiss, in the moonlight spilling through the hotel room.

No, he doesn’t regret it at all.

* * *

_It Might Have Happened Like This_

“Why did we do this again?” Buck hisses as Maddie adjusts his tie.

“Because several people would’ve killed you if you didn’t invite them,” she replies, completely unsympathetic. “Why, worried Eddie will get cold feet?”

“No.” He knows Eddie. When Eddie commits, it’s one hundred percent. He never backs down, even when he should. He’s loyal to the end, and beyond.

It’s more that… he doesn’t even know what. He’s just nervous and there’s not even a good reason for it. Why would he be nervous? He’s about to tell the person he loves most in the world just how much he loves him. He’s about to say to the world _this is the person I chose_. And it’s in front of his family, his friends.

But his stomach is threatening to upend his breakfast all over his sister’s very lovely pink dress.

He struggles to breathe and Maddie frowns. “Hey. You okay?”

Buck nods. “I don’t know why I feel kind of sick.”

To his surprise, she smiles. “If you weren’t feeling a little sick I’d be worried. I felt the same way.”

“…even with Chim?”

“Oh yeah. Even more so. I didn’t… I didn’t let myself feel nervous, with Doug.” She gives a quick, sad smile, there and gone in an instant. “But with Chim I… I didn’t know why. We had a baby already, I knew this was what I wanted—and I think that’s what it is. You want something so much, more than anything, and finally getting it is—it’s overwhelming.”

She smooths her hands over his chest. “You’re scared something will go wrong. That you can’t really have it. But then you’ll walk down that aisle, and you’ll say _I do_ , and he’ll say it back—and you will get it.” She takes his face in her hands. “You’ll get everything.”

“I already have everything,” he replies, and suddenly the nerves are gone.

He has everything. He has Eddie, and Chris, he has his family, and the larger family of the 118. He has his sister, who’s happy with a husband who adores her and a niece that Buck and Albert compete to spoil rotten. He has a job he loves that often drains him but even more often leaves him feeling fulfilled.

He has everything. There’s no reason to be nervous.

Buck takes Maddie’s hands in his. “Let’s do this.”

There was quite a lot of discussion over who was walking where, and since they’re doing this in Bobby and Athena’s backyard which isn’t huge, meeting in the middle isn’t an option. Eventually Eddie admitted, voice quiet, that he wanted to be the one waiting at the top. He wanted to “do all of it” this time, instead of the rushed, quiet affair just with their parents that he’d had with Shannon after they’d come to their families about the pregnancy.

Buck didn’t care then and he doesn’t care now, if it’s what Eddie wants, Eddie’s going to get it.

They both put their foot down on the music, though. No bridal march, thanks.

Joy was too small to participate in the wedding of her parents, so she was excited to get to be a flower girl, because at three years old, throwing flowers sounds like the best thing ever. Other than that, though, it’s just Buck walking with Maddie, their arms linked.

Eddie looks… well, Buck saw him just that morning, but he looks so damn handsome that Buck nearly thinks _screw it_ and kisses him even before the rings are exchanged. Christopher gives Buck a thumbs-up from where he sits in the front row, and Buck realizes, distantly, that his face is starting to hurt because he’s smiling. He hadn’t even realized.

Eddie slips his hands into Buck’s, and Buck squeezes tightly. Neither of them wanted to go with black, so Buck’s in navy and Eddie’s in burgundy, the color as warm as he is, and Buck would normally roll his eyes at having thoughts like that but it’s his _wedding_ , damn it, he can be as sappy as he wants.

It took them a year of planning to get here. Not that they wanted it to take that long, or even be that fancy, but apparently things need to be reserved far in advance, and relatives needed enough time to plan to come (Sophia had some very colorful ideas for what she’d do to them if she couldn’t be there and Buck’s not scared of her because she loves him but Eddie is properly terrified of the unholy wrath of big sisters), and before they knew it, everything was taking months to pull together.

But they’re here now. Eddie’s eyes are warm, golden, and Buck wants to sink into them. It was all so fucking worth it, to have everyone they love here, to have Eddie squeezing his hands. To be able to say the words he’s been practicing in front of the mirror for hours, days, weeks.

“My whole life, I was looking for a family.” He looks over at Maddie and winks. “If only to give my sister a break.”

Maddie has that smile on her face that means she’s smiling so she doesn’t cry, and Buck would hug her, but he’s kind of unable to let go of Eddie’s hands right now.

He meets Eddie’s gaze again. “I thought—when I found it—I’d just know. Might’ve been all the movies I was watching. But I thought I would find them, and I’d take one look and feel that thunder roll through me and think, _that’s the one_.

“And then you came along and I thought _who the hell is that?_ ”

Bobby, Hen, and Chim all give knowing chuckles. Eddie has to squeeze Buck’s fingers so he doesn’t flip them off in front of children.

“I thought I would know when I found that one person. The way I walked into the 118 and knew that they’d be important to me. But when I did find you… there was no fireworks in my head, just this… sense of being upside down. You were like a magnet and I didn’t know why, I just wanted to be near you, I couldn’t stop myself. All the time. I found myself doing anything to make you smile, making stupid jokes, bribing you with food. I couldn’t stop _talking_ about you, I think I drove Maddie nuts.”

He takes a deep breath. “But I didn’t… I didn’t know what it meant. Until I was…” His throat works and he has to swallow a couple times, clear it out. “Until I was trying to keep you warm, on the way to the hospital.”

Eddie’s thumb smooths up and down over Buck’s knuckles, grounding him, _I’m okay, I’m alive, I’m here_.

“I fought it so hard. I didn’t—I didn’t want it, I pretended it wasn’t there, because it wasn’t like anything—it was like I was staring at—glass in the sunlight. I couldn’t look at it. You’d just… snuck in and become my whole world and I didn’t know what to do and then you—you kissed me. And I thought—how _stupid_ I was for ever fighting it. Fighting you. I’ve never felt so—so _held_ as when I’m with you. We built this, together, and I didn’t know until I was in it, and I never want to resist that pull again. The rest of the world’s upside down, you’re the one who makes it right-side-up. I don’t need thunder or lightning or fireworks I just need, I just want, you. I want to keep building this with you, for the rest of my life.”

Eddie does that adorable wrinkled-nose expression that he gets when he’s trying not to cry, and Buck’s not sure who’s shaking more as he slides the ring on, him or Eddie. But they manage not to drop it, so that’s a win.

The moment Eddie starts talking, Buck knows he’s not gonna survive this.

“I really had no plans on being with anyone, after… again. It wasn’t even in my mind to—to think about and reject, it just never occurred to me.” Eddie’s voice is soft and rough. “I just assumed I’d be alone, and it was fine, and that was just how it would be. I never thought…”

He trails off, takes a deep breath. Buck knows—words are hard, for Eddie. He was surprised that Eddie agreed to writing their own vows. But Eddie also never backs down from making an effort for those he loves, and Buck… yeah. Buck has no way to define how much that means.

“While I was trying to write these vows, I kept throwing my mind back, trying to find when I fell in love with you. I had to know, right? Everyone says, _that’s when it happened_. But I had no idea. I still don’t.”

Buck’s not even sure the others in the backyard can hear the words, Eddie’s voice is so low, but that doesn’t matter. Buck hears them.

Eddie clears his throat. “I remember when I realized, though. It was that one long shift and we both came home and took naps, and I slept later than you did—and I woke up and you’d helped Chris with his homework and made dinner and I thought—I wanted that, every day for the rest of my life. You stirring pasta while singing… _very_ off-key Jon Bellion.”

Buck can’t help the laugh that bubbles out of him.

“That’s when I knew what I’d built.” Eddie’s voice is even softer now. “That’s when I knew what I wanted. And then I managed to freak out about it for three more months until I kissed you.”

He huffs in embarrassment. “The point is, I know it took me a long time to figure it out. To know what I had with you. But you were so patient with me, every step of the way, and even if I don’t always have the words for it… I know it every time I come home to you, I wake up to you, and I’ll know it fifty years from now. I love you.”

Buck definitely uses the ring being slid on his finger as an opportunity to use his free hand to wipe at his eyes.

He doesn’t even hear Bobby—but the next thing he knows, Eddie’s warm hand is on his cheek, and Eddie’s warm mouth is on his, and the nerves are completely gone.

* * *

_It Could Have Happened Like This_

Eddie grins behind his menu as Christopher very proudly tells the server that his dads just got married.

He would normally be a little embarrassed—he’s not the type to draw attention to himself, good or bad—but the fact that Christopher’s so _happy_ about it fills him with so much warmth he can only smile.

Certain other people in their lives are less happy about it, or will be once they figure out the real reason Buck, Eddie, and Christopher went on a ‘family vacation’ for the holiday weekend.

Honestly, eloping hadn’t been the first idea on their list. They’d seriously considered a wedding. But then they’d started to realize exactly how many people they’d need to invite, and Buck had brought up how much work Chim and Maddie had put into their wedding—and that had been a small one.

Yeah, neither of them wanted to put all the time and money into that. They don’t exactly have a millionaire father in Korea footing the bill.

Not to mention Eddie’s just… well. Therapy does wonders, but it’s not going to change his nature, and the idea of standing up in front of several people, even if it’s people who love them, to announce how he loves Buck?

…not happening. Those words are for Buck, and Buck alone. God knows he’s whispered plenty of confessions into the seashell curve of Buck’s ear, the ocean beat of Buck’s heart, during the soft dark hours of night when only Buck can hear his halting words and snapped-off sentences. He doesn’t need to repeat to an audience things Buck already knows.

Also Buck objected to wearing a suit.

But they had to do something. They’re not going to just jet off somewhere, they’re too damn old to drive to Vegas, and they would never do anything without Christopher, anyway, but there had to be something special they could do.

Then Buck remembered the cabin.

Christmas in 2020 hadn’t sounded like a great idea. They had to be careful. And so Buck had suggested, instead of the usual family get-together, that the two of them take Chris up to a cabin in the mountains for a few days so he could see the snow and get a white Christmas. It didn’t always snow in the California mountains in time for December but they’d lucked out that year and Eddie still remembers with crystal clarity the look on Christopher’s face, the image of Chris and Buck throwing snowballs at each other.

The people who own the cabin and rent it out own several other cabins around, so when Buck called and asked, they confirmed they’re ordained ministers for some mountain weddings, the usual hipster Instagram stuff with flowers everywhere and possibly a fantasy theme.

So he, Buck, and Christopher drove up. And they got married, on the front porch of the administration cabin where people come to get the keys and mail, just them and the owners and with Christopher sitting on the porch swing.

The cabin’s waiting for them, but first, they want an early dinner after that long drive. Eddie knows Buck’s fondly rolling his eyes at Eddie’s impatience, his insistence that they get married _first_ and eat later, but…

Buck’s slid into every crevice, every crook and cranny, in Eddie’s life. Everywhere Eddie looks, there’s Buck. He just wants that to be official. The next time one of them—God forbid—ends up in a hospital, he wants nobody to stop him from sitting by Buck’s bedside, or having Buck by his. If anything happens to him, he needs Buck to be with Chris. He might not scream it from the rooftops but he wants everyone to quietly, solidly know they’re intertwined.

He took so long to figure out what he wanted, what he had. He won’t apologize for not being able to wait another second.

But the words are said, the deed is done, and he and Buck are married. As Christopher is happy to tell anyone who will listen.

“Congratulations,” the server says, and she sounds like she means it. “Calls for a celebration. What are you gents in the mood for?”

She brings them free dessert later, and Eddie has a feeling Chris is now going to try and get a lot of mileage out of the ‘just married’ factoid.

When they drive up to the cabin, it’s dark, and Eddie unloads their (few) bags while Buck gets a fire started. They have a card deck and board games, and up here in the mountains the February chill can really be felt, and Buck is a welcome warmth next to him, in his space, as they move through the cabin setting things up.

They have two days to just relax and be together. Two days to wake up whenever they want, go on walks through the woods around them, play games or read. Two days to just be a family, the three of them. Two days for Eddie to soak in the sensation of wholeness. The knowledge that this is the beginning of the rest of his life.

He knows he already started the beginning long ago. It started before he and Buck first kissed. Before Buck moved in. Maybe it started all the way back when he first smiled at that sheepish face and said _you can have my back any day_ and Buck first looked at him with something like adoration in his eyes.

But it’s… there’s still something nice, something permanent, about making it official. About the ink on paper, and the rings on fingers.

Christopher hugs him before bed. “I’m glad it was just us,” he whispers.

He’s getting so damn tall, but he can still tuck his head under Eddie’s chin when they hug. Eddie relishes it while he can. Chris is long and lanky, always has been, and he’s definitely going to be taller than Eddie someday.

He holds on tight and kisses the top of Chris’s head. “We wouldn’t have it any other way.”

It wouldn’t be a proper wedding, a proper anything, without including his son. Their son.

After Christopher’s tucked himself in—he’s old enough to get to bed by himself now but sometimes Eddie will sneak in and check in on Chris after he’s asleep, reassuring himself—it’s just him and Buck in front of the fire.

They’ve stretched out like this on the couch so many times at home, even before they wanted to admit what they were. Eddie knows that fundamentally, nothing’s changed. But it feels significant. It still feels profound, somehow.

Eddie likes Buck’s weight on top of him. Buck likes being held, and will shamelessly appropriate parts of Eddie for a pillow—and Eddie feels grounded when Buck’s on top of him. He feels like he won’t ever float away or disappear.

He wraps an arm around Buck, pushes his hand up underneath Buck’s shirt to feel the warm, smooth skin. For a few minutes they stare into the fire, saying nothing.

“I’m glad we did this,” Buck says at last. “That we did it this way.”

“Even when we face the wrath of our friends and family on Tuesday?”

He can feel Buck smile. “Yeah. I mean I love them. Obviously. But I think it was right that we had it… just us. This time to celebrate us.”

Celebrate. Yes. Even if it’s not what most people would call a celebration. There’s no party or grand event, no big trip to Disneyland or Hawaii. Most people elope to some exotic location far away, they don’t just vanish up to the local mountains for a weekend. But it works, for them. They’ve always been low key, intimacy found in the sharing of meals, of shifts, the brushing of shoulders, built brick by brick in the every day.

It’s not the kind of love story anyone would ever really write a movie about. But Eddie thinks there’s nothing wrong with a quiet story. It’s no less fulfilling. And taking the time to stop and take a breath and say _yes, it’s you, and it will always be you_ is everything that he needs.

They end up falling asleep like that, his husband’s head on Eddie’s shoulder, his husband’s warm skin under his hands, and most of all, his husband’s heart beat against his.

* * *

_It Almost Went Like This_

Honestly, Buck’s not sure what insanity convinced Chim and Maddie to undergo a big wedding in the first place.

Maddie’s already had one big, traditional wedding—one that their parents pointedly did not attend—and Chim’s not really the kind of guy to make a big fuss. They’ve already had a kid together, for crying out loud.

But somehow, one way or another, they’ve planned a big damn wedding.

Or, well, Buck’s planned a big damn wedding.

Not that he’s going to take credit for the whole thing, but he’s ended up helping out a lot, and offering up his opinions on the cake, the flowers, the seating arrangements—and half the time Chim just says “Buck’s right” and Maddie says “whatever you think” and Buck just makes a decision and hopes neither of them will kill him on the big day.

Still, this whole thing is really nice, he has to admit that. They’re in the rose garden at the Huntington, and Buck has never seen parental guilt put to such productive use (or seen Albert so thoroughly pump his mom to pump his dad to pay for the other half). It’s beautiful, and Buck can’t wait to watch his sister walk down the aisle and see her happy.

Not that she isn’t happy already, but he’s known what she and Chim both went through, and she deserves to have as big and beautiful of a celebration as she wants.

He’s up at the front with Eddie, currently, the both of them in the pastel colors that Maddie wanted for the whole thing, and Buck’s not sure how he looks in his but purple really suits Eddie. Buck’s not good at the whole… seasons, skin tone thing, he just means—Eddie’s personality. Purple fits it.

“Where’s Chim?” he whispers.

Eddie gives him a weird look. “I thought he was with you.”

“No, I was with Maddie, but then she sent me up here.”

They both look over at Josh, who shrugs and looks at Albert, who’s smiling at the wedding photographer and doesn’t seem to realize they’re staring at him.

“Um.” The pastor, a friend of a friend, leans in. “Sorry to interrupt but we are starting to run behind.”

Buck looks at his boyfriend again. Eddie looks just as baffled as Buck feels. “Do you think they got cold feet?”

“About getting married? Are you kidding me?” It’s all Maddie and Chim have talked about for the last year.

Buck looks out over the assembled guests. There’s Bobby and Athena, Hen and Karen, Michael and David and the kids. Christopher’s with them. He sees Maddie’s friends and coworkers from work, a few neighbors, the Lees…

But neither his sister nor his future brother-in-law.

He makes eye contact with Athena, who nods and gets up to see what’s going on. Buck’s not sure he should go investigate himself.

Eddie takes his hand. “Hey. It’s okay, whatever it is.”

Buck squeezes his hand tightly. “I know. It’s just—bad luck seems to follow us around sometimes.”

“I object to being called bad luck,” Eddie teases.

It’s a terrible joke but it works, and Buck snorts with laughter, relaxing. “When we do this we should just run away to the Bahamas.”

There hasn’t been any official proposal. Buck just started joking that Eddie should marry him, and the more he made the joke, the less of a joke it became, until he just started saying _when we get married_ and Eddie never objected.

A few months ago, Eddie started saying it back. _When we get married…_

They had a few serious conversations after that. Conversations about Christopher, about other kids, about their families and the future, about work and expectations. Buck’s never gotten down on one knee, and Eddie’s never given him a ring, and he suspects that when the time comes it won’t go the typical way, but he knows that it will happen. They will get married, and finish binding themselves together the way they’ve been going, stitch by stitch, every day since they met. Even if it took them a while to realize what they had.

Honestly? Buck would marry Eddie right this second if Eddie wanted. He doesn’t need any plans, he doesn’t care where it is or how they go about it. He just wants to be able to say _my husband_ , wants _Diaz_ on his turnout instead of _Buckley_.

People are starting to shift in their seats, realizing that something’s going on. Athena returns, but just shakes her head enigmatically when Buck catches her gaze.

“I should go find Maddie,” he says to Eddie, and it’s the moment he says that the woman herself appears, her hand caught up with that of her fiancé.

Thank fuck. A tightness in Buck’s chest that he didn’t even know he had loosens.

Maddie and Chim are smiling, looking… giddy, almost. Buck relaxes more, and Eddie gives him a fond _I told you so_ look.

Buck would walk across fire for that look, to be honest.

Maddie and Chim get up to the start of the aisle, and that’s when Buck notices Maddie’s not wearing her shoes. She’s barefoot. And she’s not holding her bouquet. And… Chim’s tie is off, the top couple buttons of his shit undone and rumpled, like he opened them quickly in a moment of stress, needing to breathe better.

“Hey, everyone,” Chim says, giving a wave. “Uh. We’re sorry to do this to you, but the wedding is off.”

Buck feels his jaw drop open.

“We love you all,” Maddie adds. “But we’re going to go now.”

There’s total silence as everyone stares, probably convinced they misheard, or maybe just in total shock like Buck is. He’s really not sure what’s happening. What did he miss? What puzzle piece did he not see? This can’t have come out of nowhere. There must be a good reason.

“Um, enjoy the reception!” Chim finishes, and then—then the two lovebirds are taking off like the police are on their tails.

Buck turns and stares at Eddie to silently ask him _did that really just happen_. Eddie shakes his head, eyebrows climbing up to his hairline.

“Huh,” Albert says.

“What—what do we do now?” Josh asks.

A ripple goes through the assembled guests as everyone apparently asks themselves, and each other, the same question. _What do we do now?_

Buck’s inwardly cringing at the price tag on this thing, a price tag that Mr. Han and Buck’s own parents are probably going to be prepared to commit murder over.

He looks to his friends for some kind of answer, and finds Bobby staring at—at Eddie.

Buck looks at Eddie, and finds his boyfriend staring back at Bobby.

Some kind of understanding, a silent communication, passes between them. Buck’s about to ask what it means when the pastor says, “What next?”

Buck asked himself that question, once. And while it took him a while to figure out the answer… it turned out it was right in front of him.

It’s standing in front of him right now.

He feels his hand being taken again, and then his face is turned gently as Eddie presses his palm to Buck’s cheek.

Eddie’s eyes are warm, so warm, and there’s a smile on his face that Buck’s seen only a few times before. It’s the smile that Eddie gave him right before they kissed for the first time, that smile of knowing, of having a plan and knowing Buck will be on board.

“Seems a shame to waste all of this,” Eddie points out.

Buck realizes where Eddie’s going with this, and he feels his jaw go a bit slack again. Eddie can’t—but Eddie— “Are you sure?”

‘Impetuous’ is not generally in Eddie’s vocabulary. He’s a planner. He’s a worrier. Buck’s the one who makes impulsive choices, Buck’s the one who’s spontaneous.

But no, Eddie’s standing in front of him, and nodding, and saying, “I’m sure.”

Buck can’t feel his face, that’s how hard he’s smiling. “Okay, then.”

He turns to look at everyone assembled. “Um, if you all feel like hanging out… there will still be a wedding today.”

Eddie’s hands find his again, and squeeze, and Buck squeezes back.

* * *

_It Probably Could’ve Gone Like This_

When Eddie asked Buck, _will you marry me,_ he’d kind of thought that would be the hardest part.

Not that he thought Buck would say no. He never thought that. He’s known for… months, years, honestly, probably ever since before they were even together. He’s known since they quarantined together and they just _fit_. He’s known since he realized that having Buck in his life was more an extension of himself than a separate person he’d let into his space.

He’s known since the first kiss: if he’d asked Buck to marry him right then, Buck would have said yes.

Sometimes, he thinks Buck’s known a lot longer about what they really were to each other, knew while Eddie was still fumbling in the dark.

They’re on the same page now, though. They’ve been on the same page for a long time. Buck literally moved in with him before they even started dating so really, Eddie doesn’t think proposing only six months after their first date is going too fast. They’ve been in a relationship in every way that matters since… since the tsunami. Maybe even before that.

But words are still hard for him, even such short, small ones, and so he’d really thought that asking Buck would be the hard part.

He took Buck out to their favorite taco truck by the beach, the one they started going to as a part of Buck and Christopher’s exposure therapy, and they’d walked along the water afterwards. After they’d gotten home, he’d put the box on the bathroom sink, where Buck would see it as he went to wash his face.

Buck hadn’t even opened the damn box, he’d just strode out and taken Eddie’s face in his hands, kissing him deeply. _Yes_.

He did it. He has done it. Buck said yes, they had sex, they both said a lot of rather embarrassing things that Eddie is never repeating to anyone ever, and Buck’s worn the black ceramic ring ever since. All that had to be done was figure out a day to stand in front of their friends and family and make it legal.

And apparently, _that’s_ the hard part.

Yes, okay, work as a firefighter is demanding. And trying to get basically half the firehouse a day off, the _same_ day off, so they can attend a wedding is… a lot to ask, yeah. And Eddie’s parents aren’t exactly making this easy, because when do they ever, and Buck’s still not sure he even wants his parents there at all, and they can’t decide on a venue. Most churches are right out, they don’t want anything in a hotel, it’s Los Angeles so everything’s expensive as fuck to rent, and anything outside will be subject to the whims of the weather.

Eddie’s just about ready to say _fuck it_ , smuggle Buck into a car, and drive them halfway to Vegas before Buck’s even awake.

But—it’s Buck, and Buck _loves_ parties. He’s social, a pack animal, a golden retriever in a past life. And Eddie wants to give Buck what he wants and honestly the idea of a wedding isn’t one he dislikes, he just wishes he could… show up and have it all done for him. This organizing is driving him nuts.

It’s literally been a year since he proposed, and they’re still struggling to put it all together. He wants to tear his hair out.

Eventually, they decide to take a short break. Just take a week, don’t talk about the wedding, no discussion, no planning.

Five days in, and he knows they needed this. Buck’s more relaxed, he’s stopped looking like there’s a weight on his shoulders, his muscles aren’t as tense. Eddie feels like he can breathe again, like the ring on Buck’s finger is a promise and not an expectation.

Today’s their day off, which is nice. He gets to sleep in, at least theoretically, even if the reality is that his body wakes him up like clockwork at the same time every morning anyway.

He slides under the covers, wakes Buck up properly, and then Chris is up and it’s breakfast, making sure he has all his schoolwork, and reminding him that Carla will be picking him up from school.

Buck does yoga—it helps his leg—while Eddie goes for a run. He gets back, takes a shower, and he’s just wondering if it’s a little too… nineteen-year-old boy of him to see if Buck wants to join him under the hot water, when his phone rings.

It’s Hen, which is odd, she’s on shift. “Hey, what’s up?”

“Are you and Buck doing anything?”

“Um, no?” Sometimes they have plans on their days off but today was definitely a do-nothing kind of day.

“Great, could you come over to the station, the two of you?”

“Is everything okay?”

“Everything’s great, Bobby’s got some dinner thing he’s doing.” Hen sounds fondly exasperated, and Eddie grins. When Bobby gets a ‘family bonding’ idea in his head, neither Hell nor high water is going to get in his way.

“Yeah, we didn’t have any plans.” It’s a little early for a meal but he can ask Carla to drop Christopher off at the station.

“Great! See you in… half an hour?”

“Sounds good.”

He hangs up, feeling a little… like he’s missing something, but he’s not sure enough of what exactly it is to let it bother him.

“We’re going to the station,” he announces to Buck, who’s sprawled out on the couch with a copy of _The Devil in the White City._

Eddie keeps telling him to stop reading up on serial killers because they give him nightmares but Buck’s stubborn.

Buck looks up. “We are?”

“Yup. Hen invited us, I think Bobby’s doing something.”

“Sweet.” Buck gets up. “I’ll get ready.”

When they pull up to the station, there are a few more cars than usual. Did Bobby invite other people too?

Eddie gets out, and Buck does as well—wait, is that Carla’s sedan?

“Oh good, you’re here!” Chim grabs Buck, and Hen grabs Eddie, and before he can say anything he’s got a hand over his eyes and is making some confused protests as he’s walked somewhere.

“What the hell is all this?” Buck says, not angry but definitely approaching irritated—but also sounding far away.

The hand over Eddie’s eyes is lifted and he finds he’s at the back of Hen’s car, the truck open. A suit hangs in a plastic sheet, indicating it’s been taken just from a cleaner.

“Go ahead and put it on,” Hen tells him. Her eyes are sparkling.

Eddie starts to look around for Buck, but Hen takes him by the shoulders and turns him back. “Nuh-uh. You can’t see him yet.” She grins. “Bad luck.”

“Bad luck? What—Hen what is going on.”

“You’ll see.” She hands him the suit. “Just put the damn thing on.”

It’s a navy blue suit, and for some reason Eddie recalls talking with Karen about how he and Buck don’t want to wear black for their wedding, but neither of them wants to wear white, either.

A suspicion starts to form in his mind.

He gets dressed, because he’s learned that arguing with Hen is an exercise in futility, and then he’s got a hand over his eyes again and he’s being led—he suspects to the fire station.

He can feel it when he steps inside, the ceiling shading him. There are whispers, enough that he can tell, and he thinks he recognizes some of the voices, but he can’t make it out for sure, who’s who and what they’re saying.

After a moment, Hen takes her hand off his eyes, and he blinks, staring.

The fire station’s been transformed.

The two fire trucks have been used to form the boundaries of an aisle. Blue streamers and fairy lights crisscross in between them. On the floor and on the trucks, flowers have been set up, forget-me-nots and baby’s breath and white roses. More streamers and flowers interweave up the staircase banister and along the balcony railing. On the far side of the trucks are white fold-out chairs set up in a semi-circle, and Eddie can smell familiar, delicious spices wafting down from the balcony. He’d know abuela’s cooking anywhere although he suspects she needed help, and the idea of her dictating to Bobby and Maddie and who knows else is pretty damn amusing.

It’s homey, and clearly set up by friends and family rather than a professional team, but it’s beautiful. And everyone’s there.

When he turns to Hen to thank her, he realizes she’s stepped away. Next to him, instead, is Buck.

“Holy shit,” Buck says quietly.

Eddie nods. _Holy shit_ is right.

“Hi, Dad,” Christopher calls, and Eddie whips his head around so fast it hurts his neck. He assumed Chris was here, of course, that’s basic logic and he knows that was Carla’s car in the parking lot, but seeing him all dressed up in a suit at the front in one of the chairs…

His heart thumps painfully.

Next to Chris is Sophia, and Adri. His sisters came out.

Eddie can’t feel his legs. His hand finds Buck’s, or perhaps it’s the other way around. His mind is racing, running backwards through time, remembering how he would complain to Sophia about picking color schemes, how he and Pepa talked about food, how Buck borrowed Maddie’s wedding notebook and marked it all up before eventually returning it to her, how Bobby mentioned he was technically ordained after another wedding back at his old station—

Their friends, their _family_ , paid attention. And they put together a wedding for them.

Eddie’s eyes sting and he has to wipe them with his free hand while Buck lets out a wet laugh.

“Are we going to do this?” he asks, looking over at his fiancé.

Up ahead, Michael is shamelessly taking pictures. Athena lightly whacks him on the shoulder.

Buck laughs again. “Yes,” he says. “Yes. We’re gonna let Bobby marry the fuck out of us and then I’m gorging myself on tamales and I’m going to smash cake in your face. Also I might cry.”

Eddie rubs the back of Buck’s hand with his thumb. “Then c’mon. Let’s get married.”

Hand in hand, they walk down the aisle.

* * *

_Here’s How it Really Happened_

Buck wakes up to a warm body underneath him, just like he has for the last year, and he smiles.

Eddie snores ever so slightly in his sleep, and it’s fucking adorable. Buck likes when he wakes up first—which is rare—and he can just lie there, holding and held, and enjoy the sensation of skin on skin, the two of them existing together. Eddie’s completely relaxed like this, and Buck can just… appreciate how much he loves his life.

He never thought he’d think that. _I love my life_. _I love myself._ But he does. And a good part of that is owed to the man currently allowing Buck to use his shoulder as a pillow.

Eddie stirs a few minutes later, blinking the sleep away. His smile is molasses-slow, and just as sweet. “Hey.”

“Hey.” Buck kisses the curve of Eddie’s shoulder.

“Chris awake?”

“If he is, he’s being quiet about it.”

“A miracle.”

Buck presses his lips to Eddie’s neck and Eddie slides his fingers lazily through Buck’s hair. Buck’s not trying to start something, and he knows that Eddie knows that. He just wants to feel Eddie’s pulse thrum underneath his lips. He just wants to feel _Eddie_.

His eyes slip closed as Eddie pets through his hair, and the only thing he feels is contentment.

Then Eddie says, “We do need to get up or we’ll miss the appointment.”

Buck hauls himself up onto his elbows. “Or we could just stay in bed.”

“And go through this entire process again? I don’t think so.” Eddie grins at him. “I’m marrying your ass today, Buckley.”

“Last day you can call me that,” he points out as he gets up. As if Eddie calls him that regularly, which Eddie definitely doesn’t.

It’s true, though. After this afternoon he’ll be _Evan Diaz_.

Christopher is, indeed, up already. He’s taken the day off school since if they tried to do this on a weekend it would’ve been even crazier, and after some debate, Eddie had conceded that Chris wasn’t going to die from missing a single day.

He’s already eating breakfast, and grins at Buck as he enters. “Morning, Buck.”

Christopher says _Buck_ in a way that nobody else in the world does, in a way that makes it sound like _Dad_.

“Morning, buddy.” He stops by the coffeemaker to find it’s already gotten to work. He glances over at Chris, who is the picture of innocence. “I just won’t tell Dad that the coffee machine turned on all by itself this morning, huh?”

Eddie has protested up one side and down the other that he didn’t want this big fancy coffeemaker and that it’s spying on their every move, but if anyone besides Buck or Eddie himself touches it, Eddie spends an hour fussing over it to make sure none of his personalized settings were messed up.

Buck grabs the two mugs and adds the sugar and milk, right on time to pass Eddie his as he walks into the kitchen. Eddie’s now wearing that dark red button-up shirt that Maddie got him for Christmas last year—solely because she knew it would drive Buck to madness—and he’s got the top couple buttons undone and the shirt sleeves rolled up, because he’s obviously trying to kill Buck to collect the life insurance.

“Thanks.” Eddie’s fingers drag against his as he takes the cup, and it warms Buck more than any coffee could.

It warms him every morning.

That’s part of why they chose to do it this way. There’s no fuss, it’s just like every other morning, because this is just… the next step in their lives. It’s making official what they’ve already known, and already had, for years.

Hell, Buck literally moved in and helped raised Christopher before he and Eddie even realized their feelings. They shared a bed through quarantine, and then again when Buck moved in because they both liked it and why bother rearranging furniture, and all of it went on for months before they ever kissed.

One day Buck just woke up and realized he was in a home. A home he’d built with Eddie, a home made of Eddie, and he hadn’t realized until the walls had risen up all around him and there was no way out.

He doesn’t ever want to find a way out.

In retrospect he can admit that the way he told his feelings was a little melodramatic. Voice breaking, eyes stinging, terrified but unable to hold it in anymore like the very seams of him were going to rip from the pressure if he didn’t let the truth leak out, _you’re it, you’re it for me, it’s you._

Eddie’d kissed him and Buck had held on so he wouldn’t drown in the ocean he’d made.

Eddie, on the other hand, has been remarkably lowkey about the whole thing. It was three months later while they were lying in bed, Buck half-asleep and drifting on the sensation of Eddie’s fingers sweeping up and down his back, that Eddie had said, _do you want to get married?_

Buck had sat up so fast he’d nearly smashed his forehead into Eddie’s nose, because fuck yes, there was nothing in the world he wanted more than to marry Eddie.

_Yes, yes, yes._

They’d set a date that would give them time to sort out the paperwork, including guardianship and finances, and now all they have to do is go to the courthouse.

…just as soon as they eat breakfast and Buck showers.

Like Eddie, he’s not going for the whole suit and tie look. He pulls out the soft cream long-sleeved pullover that, yes, he was wearing when Eddie first kissed him. It’s his wedding day, he’s allowed to be a sap.

Christopher, however, insisted on wearing a tie. He wanted practice before the school dance.

When they pull up, they’re given paperwork by the clerk, which they fill out, and then they have to sit around for a short bit before they’re shown in to the judge’s office. Chris takes a ton of pictures as they agree to have and to hold, for better or for worse, until death do them part.

(As if death’s going to get Eddie out of this one. Buck has every intention of haunting him in the afterlife.)

After that, it’s the tattoo parlor. They can’t wear rings at work anyway and neither of them could really find anything that spoke to them, so why get jewelry at all? Buck doesn’t want to have something he slips on and off all the time, terrified he’ll lose it someday.

The ink feels more permanent. It can’t wash off, can’t be lost or stolen or replaced.

By the time they finish with all of that, it’s late in the afternoon. They… might have planned this a particular way. Bobby got a new grill recently and he and Michael have been talking for weeks about wanting to team up and host a barbeque at the Grant-Nash household, so when they set a date, Buck and Eddie also set theirs.

They’re not the first ones to arrive. Athena’s entire family is there, of course, but Karen and Hen with their kids and Hen’s mother are also chatting it up in the backyard when they walk out.

Buck keeps his left hand hidden in a way he hopes is subtle, sticking it in his pocket whenever he thinks he can get away with it.

Maddie and Chim arrive with Joy and Albert, and the stragglers Lena and Ana arrive a few minutes after (Eddie had taken an entire week to get over the shock that he’d introduced them to each other).

That’s everyone.

Buck finds Eddie once everybody’s sitting down with their food, hooks his newly-inked ring finger in Eddie’s belt loops. “You ready?”

Eddie gives him a look like Buck’s got to be kidding him. Like Eddie’s been ready for this moment his entire life.

Buck looks out at the assembled people—his family. The people who’ve made him laugh, been there when he cried, supported him through everything. The people he’s argued with, the people he’s failed, the people who’ve frustrated him—and whom he always still loved and forgave, the people who forgave him and loved him through every piece of the mess as he put his life, himself, together.

He clears his throat. “Hey, uh, if we could have everyone’s attention for a second?”

All eyes turn to them.

Buck looks at Eddie, suddenly finding himself at a loss for words—for once in his life.

Eddie just holds up his left hand so that everyone can see the ink. “We got married.”

There’s a half-second of silence as everybody stares at them in shock, like they’re not sure if they heard that right.

Then there’s the explosion.

Maddie shoves Joy at her husband so she can demand Buck explain how he kept this a secret, Bobby’s asking for pictures, David’s asking Michael if they can do that for their wedding, Karen’s yelling she knew it the whole time, Christopher’s shoving his phone at everyone so they can see the pictures, and May, Lena, and Hen are having an intense argument over who won the bet.

Buck can’t help it. He bursts out into laughter, as Eddie gives him a fond smile that makes Buck’s very bones feel warm.

He knows they’re going to get some good-natured ribbing about sneaking off and doing this without telling anyone, but they wanted it to happen with no fuss, and then have a good evening spent with their whole family. And that way the words spoken are just for them and their son, that moment of promise for each other alone.

And tonight, he knows, there will be more words, sacred and soft in the space between ears and lips, and there won’t be any words at all, only actions and breath and touch. And either way—earlier, now, later—there is Eddie.

And that’s really all Buck needs, anyway.


End file.
